1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to coffee filter dispensers and, more particularly, is concerned with a coffee filter storage and dispensing canister.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The automatic drip coffee maker has become a universal favorite over the past few decades. The convenience of this appliance plus the high quality of the coffee brewed therein have provided important benefits to coffee drinkers everywhere. As is well known, a thin-walled paper coffee filter is utilized with this coffee maker. Such coffee filters are commonly sold in nested, tightly stacked packages. Such tight stacking together of the coffee filters generally makes removal of a single filter therefrom quite awkward and inefficient. The manual manipulation required is rather unsanitary and often results in the unnecessary waste of filters while separating an individual filter from the stack thereof.
A variety of coffee filter dispensers have been proposed in the prior patent art to overcome such difficulties. Representative examples of such prior art dispensers are disclosed in U.S. patents to Mamolou (U.S. Pat. No. 4,905,870), Ritson (U.S. Pat. No. 4,957,217), Rohde et al (U.S. Pat. No. 4,971,222) and Anderson (U.S. Pat. No. 5,067,627). The Mamolou and Ritson dispensers each provides a bowl-like container for storage of a plurality of coffee filters therein with gripping means attached to an overlying cover for separating the uppermost individual filter from the remaining filters therebelow. The Rohde et al dispenser provides a canister for storing a plurality of coffee filters having a movable dispensing applicator insertable into the canister for separating an uppermost individual filter from the remaining stack thereof. An alternative embodiment of the Rohde et al dispenser provides spring features disposed in the lower part thereof to facilitate compression of the filter stack against the gripping means provided on the movable dispensing applicator. The Anderson dispenser provides a housing for storing a plurality of coffee filters with a side dispensing flap and having a crank arm with depending gripping means installed through the top of the housing. The crank arm is circumferentially rotatable such that the gripping means depending therefrom separates an uppermost individual filter from the remaining stack thereof for dispensing the individual filter outwardly through the side dispensing flap.
The Mamolou, Ritson and Rohde et al dispensers are each fairly simple in design and construction, thereby being relatively inexpensive to produce. By contrast, the Anderson dispenser is quite complicated in design and construction and thus appears to be far more costly to manufacture. Each of the four dispensers provides gripping means focused solely on separating an individual filter from a densely packed stack thereof. The efficiency of such separating action is somewhat problematical, given the density of such filter packing and the peripheral corrugated configuration of each individual filter, being nested together. Additionally, there is often very limited space available for the location of such dispensers near the automatic coffee maker.
Consequently, a need still exists for a coffee filter dispenser which provides dual cooperating gripping means for coordinating the separating and dispensing of an individual filter from the dispenser while retaining the remaining filters therein.